I was born in Poonch (Kashmir) and now I live in Norway. I oppose war and violence and am a firm believer in the peaceful co-existence of all nations and peoples. In my academic work I have tried to espouse the cause of the weak and the oppressed in a world dominated by power politics, misleading propaganda and violations of basic human rights. I also believe that all conscious members of society have a moral duty to stand for and further the cause of peace and human rights throughout the world.

Monday, December 30, 2013

– On Sunday, 29 December,Israel’s
Ministerial Committee on Legislation approved a bill to annex the Jordan
Valley of Palestine’s occupied West Bank. The bill shall ensure that
the region remains within Israeli sovereignty even if an agreement with
Palestine is reached under the ongoing, US-facilitated, talks or any
other agreement in the future. A closer look reveals that there is
nothing new in the proposed bill, and that neither of the two major
Palestinian factions are likely to respond by implementing a policy that
is consistent with the liberation of Palestine.

File – Maan News Agencies

The bill has been proposed by Member of Israel’s Parliament (Knesset)
Miri Regev and has been supported by eight Ministers from Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, Yisrael Beitenu and
Habayit Hayehudi, reports the Israeli news agency y-net.
The sponsor of the bill, Miri Regev, is a former Brigadier General of
the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and a former military spokeswoman.

Few of the politicians who so brazenly proclaim the benefits of drones have a real clue how it actually works (and doesn’t)

Whenever I read comments by politicians defending the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Predator and Reaper program – aka drones
– I wish I could ask them some questions. I’d start with: “How many
women and children have you seen incinerated by a Hellfire missile?”
And: “How many men have you seen crawl across a field, trying to make it
to the nearest compound for help while bleeding out from severed legs?”
Or even more pointedly: “How many soldiers have you seen die on the
side of a road in Afghanistan
because our ever-so-accurate UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicle] were unable
to detect an IED [improvised explosive device] that awaited their
convoy?”

Few of these politicians who so brazenly proclaim the benefits of
drones have a real clue of what actually goes on. I, on the other hand,
have seen these awful sights first hand.

Saturday, December 28, 2013

On July 13, former Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin issued a dire warning
to the government of Israel: either it will reach some kind of two-state
settlement or there will be a “shift to a nearly inevitable outcome of
the one remaining reality — a state ‘from the sea to the river’.” The
near inevitable outcome, “one state for two nations,” will pose “an
immediate existential threat of the erasure of the identity of Israel as
a Jewish and democratic state,” soon with a Palestinian-Arab majority.

On similar grounds, in the latest issue of Britain’s leading journal
of international affairs, two prominent Middle East specialists, Clive
Jones and Beverly Milton-Edwards, write that “if Israel wishes to be
both Jewish and democratic,” it must embrace “the two-state solution.”

It is easy to cite many other examples, but unnecessary, because it
is assumed almost universally that there are two options for cis-Jordan:
either two states — Palestinian and Jewish-democratic — or one state
“from the sea to the river.” Israeli commentators express concern about
the “demographic problem”: too many Palestinians in a Jewish state. Many
Palestinians and their advocates support the “one state solution,”
anticipating a civil rights, anti-Apartheid struggle that will lead to
secular democracy. Other analysts also consistently pose the options in
similar terms.

Friday, December 27, 2013

Photo from The White House | (Note: Photos
like the one above are released as a substitute for granting
photographers from the press access.)

For the first time since the United States began to launch drone
attacks, a strike was launched late on Christmas Day in Pakistan. Four
people who could not be identified but who were allegedly from
Afghanistan were killed.

The Pakistani newspaper, The Express Tribune, reported,
“Four suspected militants were killed when a US drone fired missiles at
a compound in North Waziristan Agency in the late hours of Wednesday.”

Two missiles were fired at a compound. A local tribesman said he had
heard “two huge explosions” in the “outskirts of Miramshah.” Tribesmen
left their homes in panic.
“We can still hear the sound of drones hovering in the sky,” he said,
adding that the bodies were being pulled out of the compound.

The Pakistan Tribune also reported,
“Panic gripped the area following the attack as unmanned aircraft kept
flying over the area till wee hours of Thursday morning.” And, “The
identity of the deceased couldn’t be ascertained because of their
charred bodies.”

Thursday, December 26, 2013

There has been yet another violent attack with mass casualties. This
was not the act of a lone gunman, or of an armed student rampaging
through a school. It was a group of families en route to a wedding that
was killed. The town was called Radda—not in Colorado, not in
Connecticut, but in Yemen. The weapon was not an easy-to-obtain
semiautomatic weapon, but missiles fired from U.S. drones. On Thursday,
Dec. 12, 17 people were killed, mostly civilians. The London-based
Bureau of Investigative Journalism has consistently tracked U.S. drone
attacks, recently releasing a report on the six months following
President Barack Obama’s major address on drone warfare before the
National Defense University (NDU) last May. In that speech, Obama
promised that “before any strike is taken, there must be near-certainty
that no civilians will be killed or injured—the highest standard we can
set.” The BIJ summarized, “Six months after President Obama laid out
U.S. rules for using armed drones, a Bureau analysis shows that covert
drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan have killed more people than in the
six months before the speech.” In a nation that abhors the
all-too-routine mass killing in our communities, why does our government
consistently kill so many innocents abroad?

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

The Christmas season celebrates the
regal myth of Jesus – his supposedly miraculous birth and royal lineage
as a king of kings – but that loses sight of the historical Jesus and
his revolutionary message of justice for the poor and powerless, as Rev.
Howard Bess reflects.

By the Rev. Howard Bess

The emergence of Jesus as a Jewish prophet of note was something that
no contemporary would have predicted. After all, he lived in a world
where leaders were determined by the prominence of their birth or by
their effective use of violence.Jesus possessed neither. He came from humble origins and taught
nonviolence. Jesus gained a following among the poor as a reputational
rabbi, meaning that he lacked a formal education and religious training.
He also lived in the small town of Nazareth, nearly 100 miles north of
Jerusalem, the area’s primary seat of religious and political power.

Jesus of Nazareth delivering his Sermon on the Mount as depicted by artist Carl Bloch.

The earliest written record of the life of Jesus was the gospel
written by an unknown author called Mark, who says nothing about a
miraculous birth or about royal lineage. (The fiction of his miraculous
birth to a woman with royal ties was fabricated decades later.)

‘It is all too simple to criticise Mandela for
abandoning the socialist perspective after the end of apartheid: did he
really have a choice? Was the move towards socialism a real option?’
Photograph: Media24/Gallo Images/Getty Images

In the last two decades of his life, Nelson Mandela
was celebrated as a model of how to liberate a country from the
colonial yoke without succumbing to the temptation of dictatorial power
and anti-capitalist posturing. In short, Mandela was not Robert Mugabe,
and South Africa remained a multiparty democracy with a free press and a
vibrant economy well-integrated into the global market and immune to
hasty socialist experiments. Now, with his death, his stature as a
saintly wise man seems confirmed for eternity: there are Hollywood
movies about him – he was impersonated by Morgan Freeman, who also, by
the way, played the role of God in another film; rock stars and
religious leaders, sportsmen and politicians from Bill Clinton to Fidel
Castro are all united in his beatification.

Sunday, December 01, 2013

Key points in the government’s version of 9/11 events do not stand up
to scientific scrutiny, according to McKnight Professor Emeritus, Dr.
Jim Fetzer, a distinguished philosopher of science, who has more than 20
books on scientific reasoning, artificial intelligence and cognitive
science. Fetzer formerly taught at the University of Minnesota Duluth
and is the founder of Scholars for 9/11 Truth.

Writing in a new book titled, “The Dynamic Duo” (CWG Press), about
the events of September 11, 2001, and to me, Fetzer offered multiple
reasons as to why The 9/11 Report should be viewed as fantasy:

(1) “The government’s explanation [of the destruction of the Twin
Towers] would violate laws of physics and engineering that cannot be
transgressed.” Among these is that melting point of structural steel AT
2,800 F., far above the 1,700 F. of burning jet fuel. NIST studied 236
samples of steel from the WTC and found 233 had not been exposed to
temperatures above 500 F. and the others not above 1,200 F. “That these
towers were brought down by fuel fires is not just improbable but
physically impossible.” He added, “Most Americans may not realize that
no steel-structure high-rise building has ever collapsed from fire in
the history of civil engineering, either before or after 9/11.”

Saturday, November 30, 2013

Now we have the expert opinions of two
psychologists, Roger Buck and Dr Nick Medvecky. However, coming to the
theme from a different angle, I’ll say that I have followed the politics
of American presidents from the time of Eisenhower onwards. How do I
see Obama? Well, Obama is not any exception to the general rule of
pro-imperialism polices that his predecessors have followed. He has
closely followed in the footsteps of George W. Bush, the war criminal
and vicious murderer of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans.
Obama has continued the policies of Bush because the superpower he leads
is based on the assertion of American military power and domination.
Like his predecessors Bush or Nixon, etc., his violations of
international laws and international norms, the killing of foreign
people with impunity, having no regard to international public opinion
are very serious matters.

However, the only ‘justification’ the
American rulers can resort to is their internalized holy mantra of
‘American exceptionalism’. What this means is this: American rulers can
do whatever they want without being accountable to any authority in the
world. We should keep in mind when Obama received the Nobel Peace Prize
in 2009 in Oslo, he used the occasion to tell the world that he would
carry on wars! He used his high-sounding nonsensical rhetoric to defend
wars to the amazement of millions around the world. His warmongering and
aggressive polices he has pursued since then show he had literally
meant what he said.

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Islam, a religion, cannot be
turned into a handmaiden of politics; when this occurs, Islam is turned
into Islamism. Its defining characteristic is its intolerance of others,
including Muslims, and glorification of violence against all who
disagree. The conflict inside the Muslim world might be characterized as
one between tyranny and freedom, even if that tyranny is packaged in
God’s name. The strategically right thing to do is provide moral and
material assistance to Muslims struggling against Islamists.

Since 9/11 the West has been confounded with the question whether
Islam and Islamism are one and same, or if there is a critical
distinction to be drawn between the two. How this question is answered
has profound implications for understanding and explaining the immense
convulsion seizing the Muslim world, and on how best to frame a proper
response without undermining or eroding the secular and liberal
democratic culture of the West.

Islamism is — from the perspective of someone born and raised within
the mainstream majority Sunni Islam — an ideology fascistic and
totalitarian in impulse and action, masquerading as religion. The
proponents, advocates, activists and apologists of Islamism,
irrespective of whatever guise these Islamists assume in public, are
engaged in the sort of radical politics the West became acquainted with
in the early decades of the twentieth century with the rise of
Communism, Fascism and Nazism.

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

The
discussion between the two is a non-starter because they are speaking
from two different and totally opposite premisses. Mehdi Hasan, a
journalist, is arguing on the basis of his ‘Islamic faith’. Therefore he
feels comfortable to justify his belief
in the flying horse of the Prophet Muhammad because many Muslims
believe so. He doesn’t have to offer any rational explanation; his
claims to his religion seem to work wonders for him, exonerating him of
responsibility to offer any rational explanation in support of his
standpoint. His manner of speaking and his populist assertiveness before
the young audience shows he feels he has some superior knowledge which a
scientist like Richard Dawkins doesn’t have! Apparently there is little
ground for Dawkins to use any reasonable argument with someone who is a
traditional believer in supernatural beings and miracles and has no
inhibition that his beliefs run counter to all common sense and rational
understanding of natural phenomenon. Here we have a clear instance of a
religious person who rejects scientifc viewpoint and is immune to any
rational view of the things the two were supposed to discuss.

Sunday, November 17, 2013

“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

—Voltaire (1694 – 1778)

The
wise words of Voltaire can be applied to a number of
situations. Those who have political, economic, social and religious
power over others make them believe as true which in many cases are
absurd lies and misleading garbage. Accordingly, such misled people will
be ready to commit all sorts of atrocities when asked to do so without
any guilt or remorse. Those who have global political and military power
and aggressive designs on other countries hush up the cult of
patriotism and push their armies to do the patriotic duties by
unleashing destructive wars in other countries while the populations at
home applaud the glorious and heroic services rendered by their ‘men and
women in uniform’!

The
preachers and clerics in a violence-ridden country like Pakistan use
their rhetoric against other religious sects and minorities by calling
them infidels (kafirs) and succeed to inflame the feelings of their
congregations. Consequently, the brainwashed and misled followers of
such religious preachers kill their fellow countrymen in the name of
Allah, Islam and the Holy Prophet. It is obvious that ignorance produces
more ignorance and in such an atmosphere of perpetual frenzy of hatred
and barbarism the Shia Muslims and other religious minorities are
targeted and killed.

Friday, November 15, 2013

Exclusive: As the Obama
administration scrambles to salvage a deal with Iran on its nuclear
program, the new Saudi-Israeli alliance shows off its muscles in bending
politicians and policies to its will, Robert Parry reports.

By Robert Parry

What makes the potential of the Saudi-Israeli alliance so
intimidating is that Saudi Arabia and its oil-rich Arab friends have the
petrodollars that can turn the heads of some leaders and even
countries, while Israel can snap the whip on other politicians,
especially in the U.S. Congress, through its skillful lobbying and
propaganda.
We are now getting a look at exactly how this international
money-and-politics game plays out as Saudi Arabia and Israel maneuver to
defeat an interim agreement with Iran on freezing much of its nuclear
program in exchange for some modest relief on economic sanctions.

Secretary of State John Kerry addresses
reporters in Geneva on Nov. 8, 2013, after arriving for what turned out
to be failed talks aimed at reaching an interim agreement on Iran’s
nuclear program. (Photo credit: State Department)

Saudi Arabia and its Persian Gulf neighbors lavished contracts and
other financial favors on the economically hard-pressed French – and lo
and behold, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius showed up at the last
minute in Geneva and blew up the nuclear deal. (Last summer, the French
were in lock-step with the Saudis in their eagerness to see the U.S.
military start bombing Syria, an Iranian ally.)

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Editor’s Note:
In 1968, Time Magazine made available all issues of the previous years
as Time Capsule. The following text was published in 1925 in Time
Magazine that dealt with the question of Palestine after the Balfour
Declaration (1917). The narrative of Time Magazine is of much historical
interest that many observers and political analysts may find of value.
There is also a lot of vital information about Lord Balfour’s political
plans for Jews and Arabs in Palestine as evidenced by his contemporary
journalists. I thank David Wildsmith for sending me the text as a PDF
file.

Nasir Khan, Editor

Palestine

In an effort to control the unrest which had existed betweenArab and Zionist communities ever since World War I, theLeague of Nations made Palestine a mandate of Great Britainin 1922. The mandate lasted until 1948.——————-HOSTILE ARABS: Hale and hearty at the age of 76, Arthur James Balfour, Earl of that name, descended from his bedroomone bright foggy morning into his electrically lit studyin his electrically lit house in Carlton Gardens, London. Hesank agedly into a chair before his writing desk, opened a cablegram from Palestine sent by the Arab Executive, politicalagency of the Arabs, read:

“Realizing that the Balfour Declaration contains a policythat is fatal to Palestine, the Arab Executive has passed thefollowing resolution:

" ‘Inhabitants who are victims of the aforesaid policy willwithhold the reception otherwise due to Lord Balfour. Onthe day of his arrival, meetings will be held in places of worshipfor protest and prayer. Representatives of Arab bodieswill refrain from meeting him publicly or privately. The authoritiesresponsible for the Holy Places and national institutionswill withhold leave of access to them. Arabicpapers will appear with black borders and brief commentsin English on the Balfour Declaration. Political authoritiesin Arab countries will associate themselves with the said protests and prayers. The Palestine Government is notified thatit will be responsible for consequences resulting from Jewishdemonstrations, public or private, authorized or unauthorized.’”Why this hostility? The Balfour Declaration of 1917 haddeclared that “His Majesty’s Government view with favorthe establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewishpeople,” but specifically stipulated that “nothing shallbe done which may prejudice the civil and religious rightsof the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine.”

The letter and the spirit of this agreement have been carriedout, according to British and Jewish sources. But thefact remains that the British Government has tacitly undertakento
reconcile what are essentially irreconcilable peoples and policies.
Within Palestine, which is about the same size as the state of New
Hampshire, there are about 757,182 people, of whom 77% are Moslems (most
of them Arabs), I l % Jews, 9 % Christians, and 3% other religions.

The Moslems view with considerable alarm the infiltrationof the thrifty Jews, and since Britain tries ineffectually toside with both, a further issue between Arab and Britisheris created.

The Arab, as he has been in possession of the country forcenturies, regards himself as a national of Palestine and consequently is opposed to the Jews coming into the countryand considering themselves equally Palestine nationals. Thisresentment is heightened by the fact that the Arabs, althoughowning most of the land, are poor; while the Jews seeminglyhave unlimited wealth behind them, which comes in fromthe Zionist organization.

The Arab is opposed, as he always has been, to change;and the one thing that the Jews are doing is changing thewhole aspect of the land. The Jews, for the most part, settleon the swamps and the dry sand belts. The swamps theydrain and the sand patches they fertilize and irrigate. Inthese things the Arab finds good material for a constantstream of propaganda against the Jews, whom he chargeswith pursuing a policy calculated to drive the Arab fromthe country. Therefore, so long as the Balfour Declaration remains in force, all good Arabs must refuse to cooperate with the British Administration.

MANHATTAN TO HAIFA: It was a historic occasion marked by the presence of 5,000 excited Jews, for the president Arthurwas inaugurating a new steamship line with a sailing forHaifa, the port of Jerusalem, and carrying the flag of Judea(six-pointed star of David) on the high seas for the firsttime in 2,000 years. Men and women wept from emotionand when they were not weeping they were singing Hatikvah,Zionist anthem, or The Star-Spangled Banner.

Considerable difficulty was experienced in getting visitorsoff the boat, and as a result it was nearly an hour late in sailing.Finally, an official of the Line pleaded that, if the boatdid not catch the tide, the company would lose $15,000.Soon after this, the President Arthur weighed anchor.

lN THE PROMTSED LAND: Last week, nearly seven and a half years after the Earl of Balfour had issued his declaration favoring the establishment of Palestine as a national home for the Jewish people, he entered a special railway car provided by the Palestine Government and was whisked off acrossthe Suez Canal from Cairo to the holy land of two religions:Judaism, Christianity.

Lord Balfour went to Jerusalem. On a spur of the Mountof Olives, known as Mt. Scopus, stands the Hebrew Universitywhich he had come to open-which all Zionist Jewryconsiders of the utmost importance in the growth of whatmay be called modern Israel. He was met enthusiasticallyby the Jewish communities and by the Arabs with a paradeof mourning and the silence of grief, a protest against the Balfour Declaration.Before the opening ceremony took place, he visited Jaffa,motored to its suburb Tel-Aviv, a purely Jewish town where,it is said, everybody lives by doing someone else’s washing’Everywhere the veteran Earl was received in manifest goodwill.The great day came. Hawkers sold “Balfour biscuits”‘“Balfour keftas” (rissoles), “Balfour chocolate,” which wasnot strange in a land which has a model village named Balfouria. Dr. Chaim Weizmann, President of the World Zionist Organization,
declared the University open’ Then Lord Balfour arose and the ovation
was such that the walls of the amphitheatre were endangered.At length –
silence.

Lord Balfour spoke in his best Eton and Cambridge manner,dwelt upon the significance i:f the event which hadbrought people from all the earth’s cubbyholes’ The speechended on a Balfourian note: a graceful, tactful, courageousplea for Arab goodwill and cooperation.

LAST LAP: The last lap of Lord Balfour’s visit to the HolyLand proved more exciting than the first and ended with regrettable suddenness. The Earl and his party had proceededfrom Jerusalem to Nazareth and Haifa in a sort of triumphaltour. A tall points, he was met by enthusiastic Jewish colonists;Arabs appeared to inform him that they lived peacefullywith their Jewish neighbors.

Over the border in Syria (French mandate), things were different. At Damascus, a furious mob twice attacked hishotel. The second onslaught, which started in “The StreetThat Is Called Straight,” almost ended in a disaster, for whenthe gendarmes had nearly been overpowered French troopsappeared and spanked off, with the flats of their swords’the seething crowd, which was yelling “Down with Balfour!,”

An hour or so after the second attack, Lord Balfour wasspirited from the spot in a high-powered automobile andonly reappeared at Beirut, where he boarded a ship boundfor Alexandria, Egypt.

Monday, November 11, 2013

It was a day like this day, 96 years ago, on November 2, 1917, when
Britain decided to shift away its “problem”, and promise the Jews a
homeland in Palestine. The Arab land that was under cruel and violent
British occupation.
Britain was not trying to be good to the Jews, but surely managed to look good doing it.

Back then, the Jews have been facing some of the ugliest forms of
cruelty, racism and hatred, in Europe, especially in the Britain that
calls itself the Great.

Britain decided to grant the Jews a homeland in Palestine, a homeland
that Britain did not own, a land that Britain ruled by force, by
military might, and by massacres and crimes.

Sunday, November 03, 2013

An independent United Nations human rights expert on Wednesday held a
press conference and warned that developments in the Middle East
region, “particularly in Egypt, have made the situation in Gaza one that
is a point of near catastrophe.”
Addressing journalists at UN Headquarters, the Special Rapporteur on
human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Richard Falk noted
that because of the situation in Egypt, Palestinians now face increased
isolation, lack of access to healthcare and other services, and are
facing an uncertain future.

In his second main point of his report to the General Assembly’s
Third Committee, the Special Rapporteur reiterated that the settlements
are unlawful according to the Fourth Geneva Convention and pointed out
that financial institutions and real estate companies involved with
housing settlements in occupied Palestinian territory may be held
criminally accountable.

He told reporters that “it was appropriate and essential to implement
the unlawfulness by encouraging corporations to withdraw their
profit-making activities from the settlements.”

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

In one pithy sentence in the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of
1844, Karl Marx said something of unique philosophical importance that
had occupied the minds of so many learned people for thousands of years
and it still does. Among such people have been philosophers, mystics,
theologians and visionaries who discussed the questions relating to
supernatural beings for thousands of years. Their ideas and views have
captivated countless generations of human beings and have filled
millions of books. We see every year many thousand more volumes are
added to the same old question. But Marx like a flash of lightening saw
the reality of the fiction and put all that matter to rest. Any possible
thing that is non-objective is non-being.

Kemal Ataturk was the first Muslim ruler who understood that religion
and State have to be separated in the interest of the people. He had
seen the decadent Ottoman Caliphate and the abysmal stagnation of the
State and society under its Sultans and Caliphs. For a long time the
decaying Turkey was regarded as the ‘Sick Man of Europe’ by the European
powers. They simply didn’t know what to do with this lifeless giant!

After abolishing the Caliphate, Kemal introduced far reaching reforms
in the Turkish Republic. He didn’t force anyone to give up Islam; to
follow and practise a religion, Islam in this case, was a personal
matter; the State had nothing to do with it. The State was to be
secular, which means the State had no religion and it did not interfere
with the religion/ religions of the Turkish people in any way.

If the rest of the Muslim countries who gained independence from the
colonial powers had followed the example set by Kemal then we would have
seen a different world map. But instead the manipulators of Islam and
reactionary ideologues of Islamism (Abul Al Maududi, Hassan al-Banna,
Sayyid Qutb, etc. etc.) used Islam to push vast populations into
ignorance and darkness. That’s where at present stand the vast
majorities of the Islamic counties of the Middle East, Iran, India,
Pakistan and Bangladesh, etc. etc.

How is the fascism of the Sangh Parivar going to be utilised for capital?

We are caught in a false debate in which the reality is presented in
an erroneous perception. Narendra Modi, the perpetrator of 2002 carnage
is counter posed with Mr. Modi the “development leader”. We call it a
false debate, since for us, who have lived and grown in Gujarat over the
past five decades the two aspects are actually the same – that of
fascist. And we use the label of fascist for Modi with utmost
seriousness and with full awareness of what the term involves. Of
course, we have a different situation in India today, compared to Italy
or Germany in the 1920s and 1930s. Then, bourgeois parliamentary
democracy was not too deep-rooted in those countries. By contrast,
despite the efforts of Maoists on the extreme left and fascists on the
extreme right, parliamentary democracy has struck considerably greater
roots. This has had implications for the far left as well as the far
right. Our concern today is the far right.

Since the Sangh Parivar has been consigned by fate to operate within
‘bourgeois democracy’ for a far longer time than it had originally
envisaged (in 1947-48 it had clearly planned for a fairly swift grab for
power, creating a ‘Hindu Rashtra’ analogous to Jinnah’s plan for a
‘Islamic State’), it has been compelled to split its operations. The
BJP, as the electoral arm, has to look “moderate”. Of course, it is
“moderate” only if one argues that a hyena is moderate compared to a
wolf-pack. One should remember that the Mr. L. K. Advani, hailed these
days as a “Statesman”, was seen as aggressive as against the “moderate”
Mr. Vajpayee back in 1989-1992.

Friday, October 18, 2013

In the wake of his conflict with Gandhi over the caste/Dalit
question, B.R.Ambedkar, later to be the chief architect of India’s
Constitution making, had determined, as early as 1935—the year the
Government of India Act was passed—to leave the Hindu fold.

Upon a deeply considered evaluation of
the social content of all major religious faiths, Ambedkar chose the
Buddhist faith as the most befitting social/spiritual anchor because of
the explicit rejection in the Buddhist Dhamma of all constructions of
inequality among humankind. And a full two decades after his first
resolve to abandon Hinduism, on October 14, 1956, this agonized doyen of
the downtrodden took his vows at Nagpur alongwith some 3,80,000 Dalits,
the date of his conversion recalling the conversion of the Maurya King,
Ashok, to Buddhism after his revulsion at the massacres at the battle
of Kalinga, third century B.C.

It must be tellingly ironical that a
full half century after Ambedkar’s conversion the next mass exodus of
Dalits from Hinduism should have occurred just a few days ago in the
land of Moditva/Hindutva at Junagarh in Gujarat. At this event, some
100,000 took their Buddhist vows, which include the clear enunciation by
the convertees that “Ram and Krishna are not (our) gods.”

Pointedly, this mass rejection of
Hinduism has not taken place in some Indian state where scant claims are
made for “Hindu nationalism,” but in the one state of Gujarat which
under Modi has sought over a decade to consolidate Hindutva. Just to
recall, not too long ago, Modi defined himself unproblematically as a
“Hindu nationalist,” leaving many to wonder whether others might then
define themselves as “Muslim or Christian or Sikh nationalists” without
causing Hindutva hackles to go up.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

This poem Luis Lazaro Tijerina wrote for Vo Nguyen Giap on
his 100th Birthday two years before he passed away this year on October
4, 2013.

BIRTHDAY GREETINGS TO GENERALVO NGUYEN GIAP

The great son of Vietnam,how you traveled through the long yearsfrom your village of An Xa, in Quāng Bihn province, where beautiful orchids and the great Gianh Rivers, and the Ron and Ly Hoa rivers, flow to the seaand where the high mountain summits, Peak Co Rilata and Peak Co Preu,are covered with green…Military history and philosophy were your guides,hidden volcanoes under the swirling snows of the living.How is it that you have remained so young?Your mentor Ho Chi Minh, your victory at Dien Bien Phu,Now memories of the ancient past.You once said, “My spirit is still young, my heart still remains young.”On your hundredth birthday,passed in obscurity in an Army Hospital in Hanoi,I send you this bright flowerto go with your gem-stoned Thang Long Dragon.

Monday, October 14, 2013

Exclusive: The Israeli-Saudi
détente is slowly emerging from the shadows, with a media report on a
secret Jerusalem meeting and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s oblique
reference in his UN speech. But this powerhouse collaboration could mean
trouble for U.S. diplomacy in the Mideast, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

On Aug. 29, when I published an article entitled “The Saudi-Israeli Superpower”
describing an emerging odd-couple alliance between those two
traditional enemies, the story was met with skepticism in some quarters.
But, increasingly, this secret alliance is going public.

On Oct. 2, Israel’s Channel 2 TV news reportedthat
senior Israeli security officials met with a high-level Gulf state
counterpart in Jerusalem, believed to be Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the
former Saudi ambassador to the United States and now head of Saudi
intelligence.

And, a day before that TV report, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu hinted at the new relationship in his United Nations General
Assembly speech, which was largely devoted to excoriating Iran over its
nuclear program and threatening a unilateral Israeli military strike.

Sunday, October 06, 2013

Neither high, nor very far
Neither emperor, nor king,
You are only a little milestone,
Which stands at the edge of the highway.
To people passing by
You point the right direction,
And stop them from getting lost.
You tell them of the distance
For which they still must journey.
Your service is not a small one.
And people will always remember you.

—-Ho Chi Minh – Prison Diary

Vietnam’s great revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh aptly points to the
services of a milestone. Sometimes some human beings become such
milestones and people remember them in gratitude. One such man was
General Vo Nguyen Giap, who died on 4 October 2013. He was a titan of
military science and a far-sighted revolutionary who played a decisive
part in the liberation of Vietnam. The people of Vietnam under their
great revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh (1890-1969), his comrades and
able lieutenants, carried a heroic struggle for the liberation of their
country. No doubt, among his military commanders General Giap was the
most outstanding military strategist. He was also a scholar who chose
military vocation to serve his nation.

Under his command, the Vietnam People’s Army fought two major wars:
The First Indo-China War (1946-1954) and the Vietnam War (1960-1975).
During the First Indo-China War, he led many battles. Among them was the
famous Battle of Dien Bien Phu (1954) that sealed the fate of the
French colonial masters in Indo-China. Before the brilliant and
innovative war plans and tactics of Giap, the French were helpless. Then
came the US imperialists to impose their rule, by bolstering their
stooges in South Vietnam. Despite their enormous losses fighting when
against a superpower and its brutal war-machine, the Vietnam People’s
Army continued their heroic struggle against a vicious invader.
Americans used their destructive military and air power to destroy
Vietnam as much as they could; the devastation they caused was
horrifying.

When in 1972, Nixon and his War Mafia started their relentless
bombing of Hanoi and mined Haiphong to crush the Vietnamese patriotic
people once for all, many students and political activists in various
parts of the world had sympathy and solidarity with the the people of
Vietnam; they opposed US war of aggression. They saw a genocidal
American war becoming more and more like Hitler’s war on the Eastern
front. The question was: Will Vietnam be able to survive such barbarous
bombings? It was a deeply troubling period for many and in the life of
this writer.

During this intensive bombing by B-52 bombers, came the news that
General Giap had been killed in an aerial attack. That was the last
thing any friend of the Vietnamese people wanted to hear. What will
happen if the general was nor more? That was the question and there was
no easy answer to it. The situation was fraught with great danger for
the revolutionary forces. And we who stood for the national liberation
of Vietnam were tormented. However, soon it became clear that the
rumours of his death were part of the Nixon administration’s
disinformation. Tricky Dicky and his Secretary Kissinger were past
masters in such methods! But for this writer the news of the general
being alive was a great relief; it also meant the master strategist will
carry on as before, which he did.

President Ho Chi Minh who had died in 1969 was not able to able to
see the unification of his country. But the patriotic people of the the
Democratic Republic of Vietnam were sure to defeat American imperialists
who had made Vietnam their killing fields. The divided country was
united and the heroic Viet Cong prevailed. The United States imperialism
had for the first time been defeated by the people of Vietnam. The role
of General Giap in laying the strategy and winning the war was pivotal.

The name and work of this military genius and scholar will always
live in the hearts and minds of all freedom-loving people, everywhere.
Eternal Glory to General Giap!

Tuesday, October 01, 2013

Democracy in Pakistan has two sides. For the
majority, it is not more than a word which brings little comfort or
change in their life. But despite all the problems and poverty in this
life, they remain fully convinced of a glorious life hereafter. Their
religious mentors and preachers have managed to instil such rosy
prospects in their minds that they envision such a life of abundance and
happiness as the ultimate prize in the eternal life. For my part, I
wish them well when they get there.

But for a tiny minority it means much more:
it means power, political, social and above all economic. Therefore,
when they have political power in Pakistan they live a regal existence
in their luxurious dwellings and manor houses surrounded by friends and
allies. No doubt, this spectacle impresses friends and foes alike. They
are looked upon as the uncrowned kings and queens of the Islamic
Republic of Pakistan.

But when they lose power in some shabby
election or military coup then they continue to enjoy grand living in or
outside Pakistan, in places like Dubai, England, France, etc. in their
luxurious houses and palaces. Money is never a problem for them. The
unlimited ill-gotten millions of dollars stacked in Swiss or other
European banks keep them happy and content. As a favour to the
Pakistani majority, they only wait to take possession again of the
Presidential house or Prime Minister’s office!

Let’s not forget that Uncle Sam is always
there to support them or disown them for their full loyalty or any
suspicious move on their part. Even our Pakistani intellectuals eulogise
this uncle. How could Pakistan have survived without American money,
its patronage of some in Pakistan or without its Drone attacks, they
ask.

In addition, just out of their
far-sightedness, our royals keep new generation of political successors
close at hand and sometimes they anoint them for the future role well in
advance. During all this the vast majority keeps on chanting: Long Live
this one or that one; Long Live Pakistan! Allah-o-Akbar!!

Monday, September 30, 2013

In various old cultures and religions
women were reduced to a low status for thousands of years. The
male-dominated system or patriarchy imposed inhuman chains on them and
they (men) justified these by appealing to social customs, traditions
and religious mantras, which however remained under their control. But only
over the course of the last 150 years or so the movement for women’s
rights started in earnest and gradually gained important civic and
political rights for women in Europe and North America. The struggle for
the gender equality and gaining proper social status for women in all
spheres of life including jobs and professions is still continuing in
Europe and America.

But Islamic world has remained outside
such liberating movements and influences. The task of gaining full human
rights of women is a human task, a task in which both both men and
women have to take part. Women are marginalised in Islamic world;
therefore they need the support of enlightened men in struggle for the
liberation of women and thus help break the inhuman chains of
degradation and discrimination. We can’t expect ignorant clergy and
conservative people to do much in this area; they stand for status quo
and continued oppression of women. The role of progressive women in
making Muslim people aware of the situation is immensely important
because without their active work nothing much will change. It takes
time to realise that the liberation of women is also the liberation of
men from their nefarious role of domination and control. Thus the
liberation of women is also the liberation of men and this social
reality needs to be publicised widely.

Saturday, September 28, 2013

Those
who are well-acquainted with the Sharia laws and modern legal systems
should be in a position to show what the Sharia laws of Islam are and
how they are inadequate to protect and safeguard people and their rights
in these times. No doubt, during the early period of Islamic rule, the
system of Islamic jurisprudence (fiqah) that developed had its basis in
the Qur’anic legislation and they were progressive and innovative
according to the standards of those times. Prominent Muslim juristists
(fuqhah) used various devices, such as ijtihad, analogy, istihsan, ijma,
istidlal, to extend the laws and their application. But around the 13th
century things changed and Islamic jurisprudence came to a standstill.
It was no more able to move with the changing times. And that condition
still prevails. In addition, the Sharia law has become more regressive
and inequitable in places where it has been enforced, especially in
matters of women’s rights, male domination, criminal offences, etc. etc.

Many
ordinary people who have their traditional Islamic identity and customs
don’t have the slightest clue about the Sharia laws. Their way of
thinking is shaped not by any independent thinking or observation but by
what they hear in the sermons of their clergy and religious preachers.
Their thinking in such matters is very simple: The Sharia laws are made
by God; therefore they are always the best for all! Once they become the
laws in our countries, justice and truth will prevail; injustice and
violations of human rights will disappear. The true rule of God on earth
will appear. The lion and the goat will drink water from the same pond!

In
sum, this is all what they think and nothing more. But unfortunately
all this is illusory and has no basis in reality. Now the big question
is: How to remove such day-dreaming and misunderstandings? The answer
lies in giving the correct information. That involves a gradual and
systematic educational process. This can be performed by those who know
the inadequacy of the Sharia laws that don’t and can’t meet the needs of
people in this age. To do so is not an easy task for many reasons.
However, it is essential to impart such information in a polite and
humane way without resorting to abusive or aggressive language or making
any attacks on traditional religious beliefs and customs.

Editor’s Comment: In
this article Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed continues to explore various political
issues that led to the unfortunate partition of India whose consequences
have proved to be only negative from the point of view of the common
people on both sides of the border. The
events leading to the partition and the role of Muslim and Hindu leaders
are presented in a judicious manner, without the usual bravado we often
meet in writers who surpass in embellishing their narratives with
emotive rhetoric while consigning historical authenticity to some dark
corner.

Some of the facts the author presents are known to old historians and
observers but the younger generations in Pakistan and India are hardly
aware of these historical facts. In a clear and methodical way, the
author shows the true picture of the role of the Muslim League, the
Congress and their leaders. In Pakistan it may also come as a surprise
to some that what they have learnt in their history books was so
different from what Dr Ahmed says!

Clearly our iconic figures do not seem to have been so far-sighted or
great minds, whose concern was the interest of the masses and the
downtrodden. They represented elitist classes and power politics that
was to ensure the domination of feudal and propertied classes over the
vast majority. And in the new land but with ancient historical and
cultural roots, politics was to become a power game in the hands of a
tiny minority, civil and military. And they all played the ‘Islam Card’
for their personal ends but pushed the country into the abyss of
ignorance and darkness. That’s where we find us now.

Nasir Khan, Editor

***************************

Splitting India II

By Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed, The Friday Times, Sept. 27 – Oct. 3, 2013 Issue

In my article dated 20 September 2012, I had inadvertently given
February 1940 as the date for the fall of Singapore. It was February
1942. That mistake, however, does not detract from the fact that the
British were determined from the very start of WW II, and especially
after the Congress ministries resigned in September 1939, to crush any
challenge to their hold over the Indian empire which was a matter of
great pride for them and a major supplier of troops for the war. These
resignations were a major Congress miscalculation whose damage to their
political influence was second only to the even more disastrous Quit
India movement they launched in August 1942. These two decisions greatly
undermined their ability to influence the course of the freedom
struggle as all their cadres were incarcerated from August 1942 to June
1945.

During that absence from the political arena the Muslim League swept
the key north-western provinces of Punjab and Sindh and made inroads
into NWFP with their message that the creation of Pakistan would bring
to an end the tyranny of the caste system and the economic exploitation
of the moneylender. Thus the creation of Pakistan appeared to be a
rational choice to the Muslims and they expressed it in the 1946
provincial elections when they voted overwhelmingly in favour of
Pakistan.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

For the last two three decades the term ‘Islamist’ has commonly been
used in political discourse. It stands for those misguided and
indoctrinated ignorant Muslims whose aim is to impose their fanatical
versions of Islam on others. But we should keep in mind that Islam as a
world religion is followed by people with different world-outlooks who
are divided into numerous sects. Furthermore, these followers have
varying interpretations of the role of political power, about the
leaders of the Islamic community (the Ummah), rights and obligations of
the rulers and the ruled, etc. etc. These view of Islamic law, Sharia,
cover civil and criminal law that again are subject to four main schools
of jurisprudence within the Sunni jurisprudence while the Shias have
their own jurisprudence. There is little chance of any unity of ideas
amongst them.

What is most alarming about the Islamists’ general world-view is
their negation of the universal dimension and inherent tolerance of this
great religion. Instead they put forward a narrow and anti-social
version that goes against all principles of democracy, respect for
religious minorities and inculcate discrimination against the followers
of other faiths. The whole process can be termed as creating mental and
religious ghettos, absolutely closed to rational thought but hell-bent
on myopic divisions. In such a suffocating universe there is no room for
mutual accommodation, acceptance of secularism in a multi-religious and
multi-cultural world in which we live in Europe and some parts of
America. The Islamists misuse of Islam is a dangerous phenomenon for
democracy and common social and political values of the present age.